Dwindling Resolve

Conscientious objectors, reservists' attitudes reflect dissatisfaction with war in the territories.

AARON LIGHTNER
Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Tel Aviv

IV

e don't cry, we don't shoot!" they
yelled. "We refuse to be murderers!"
The 50 or so Israeli demonstrators
had arrived at a hill overlooking
Military Prison No. 6 near Atlit, where conscien-
tious objectors are detained.
"It is a soldier's duty to disobey illegal orders,"
explained Peretz Kidron, a white-haired activist.
"When Israeli troops commit war crimes and say,
We were just obeying orders,' they use the same
excuse as the Nazis did."
The conscientious objectors, often called
"refuseniks," represent a growing number of Israelis
who either refuse to do reserve military duty in the
West Bank and. Gaza Strip or who reject outright
any conscription into the Israel Defense Forces.
Reserve Maj. Ishai Menuchin, director of the con-
scientious objector group Yesh Gvul, says, "We are
talking about 20,000 soldiers who do not show up
for reserve duty, which constitutes a huge chunk of
the reserve pool. The fact is, fewer and fewer grown
men are willing to risk their lives protecting some
God-forsaken roadblock near Nablus."
The Israeli army says Menuchin's figures are
ridiculously inflated. Lt. Col. Olivier Ravich, an
IDF spokesman, says, "Anyone can manipulate the
reservist numbers to prove their point."
In any case, only a fraction of those who duck
reserve duty do so for ideological reasons. The trend
long predates the Palestinian intifada (uprising) for
some Israelis.
As Israeli society became increasingly affluent in
the 1990s, many preferred to spend their time trav-
eling abroad or staying with their businesses, rather
than heading off to the reserves.
The IDF won't give numbers of conscientious

objectors, but says they are anomalies among a pop-
ulation that increasingly considers the Palestinian
uprising a threat.
The army insists that morale remains as high as
ever.
"In fact, an increasing number of draftees and vet-
eran reservists have volunteered for combat units in
recent years," Ravich says.
Still, the turmoil of the intifada has given groups
like Yesh Gvul a fresh sense of purpose.
Yesh Gvul's name — a Hebrew phrase that means
both "there's a limit" and "there's a border" —
reflects the group's origins in the 1982 invasion of
Lebanon, the first war that some Israelis saw as one
of choice rather than necessity.
Since the intifada began in September 2000, Yesh
Gvul claims to have helped 400 men avoid reserve
duty, including 36 currently jailed at Prison 6.
Most Israelis have countless ways of avoiding
reserve duty — for example, taking a trip abroad,
getting a doctor's note or even injuring themselves.
Only those who specify that they refuse on ideologi-
cal grounds face the possibility of jail time.
Jail terms are about as long as the reserve duty
would be — generally, 14 to 26 days — and rarely
do the objectors suffer negative consequences in the
workplace or elsewhere when they are released.
"When I was a draftee, I enjoyed being in the
Tapuach area" of the West Bank, near Nablus,
"telling stories back home about my artillery unit,"
said Reserve Lt. Ishai Sagi, 27.
"But when I got sent back to the Tapuach area
not as a boy, but as grown man, it reminded me of
the terrible things we do there. I then told my
commanding officers that I am not willing to give
my soldiers the orders that I was forced to give,
and that this is the last time I would serve there."
Less than six months later, Sagi was ordered back
to Tapuach. When he refused, he was jailed for 26
days at Prison 6.

Reserve duty has become so undesirable in recent
years that 41 percent of Israelis believe only "suck-
ers" show up, according to a recent poll in the
Yediot Achronot newspaper. Of the total pool of
250,000 potential reservists, just 13,000 serve the
full reserve term of 26 days a year, the daily Mdariv
reported.
The Israeli army announced in September the
establishment of two new brigades, signing on
draftees for extra terms of duty to reduce pressure
on the reserve system.
For the army, the reservist dilemma is less ideo-
logical than budgetary. The army pays reservists
salaries roughly equivalent to those they receive in
the private sector.
Furthermore, after several reservists died in
action, reserve officers and their units organized to
demand expanded benefits.
Baltam is a reservist advocacy group. The army
has met some of Balsam's demands, earmarking $17
million in bonus pay for combat reservists who serve
more than 26 days, renovating bases where reservists
train and making scheduling more flexible.
In the long term, says Reserve Brig. Gen. Shlomo
Brom, a researcher at Tel Aviv University's Jaffee
Center for Strategic Studies, the IDF will have to
restructure so it doesn't rely on reservists.
In the short run, however, Brom expects few
changes: Fewer reservists want to serve at a time
when, because of the intifada, the IDF is using five •
times more reserve battalions than before.
Meanwhile, Yesh Gvul continues to canvas bus and
train stations to inform soldiers of a clause in the
IDF's code that allows them to disobey illegal orders.
Yesh Gvul members say they support the army —
but as a defensive force only.
"The myth is that pressuring the Palestinians will
protect us," Kidron said, "but it is the trigger to more
violence, and cannot provide us with security." TI

Israel Insisrig

around 10 degrees. He said he neither
ate nor slept during his time in the walk-
in freezer. A spokesman for Abraham
told the New York Jewish Week that the
stunt, dedicated to Sept. 11 victims, also
was designed to show the world that
),
Jews are "strong physically and mentally.

MLK Meets
The Talmud

New York/JTA — A one-page text of
Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream"
speech is being made available with com-
mentaries drawn from Jewish sources.
The speech, in the form of a

Talmud page, is available at
Web page, www.hillel.org . The page
was created in advance of Martin
Luther King Day on Jan. 21.

Cyrus Vance
Dies At 84

Headed by Israel's Deputy Foreign
Minister Rabbi Michael Melchior, the
formation of an international commis-
sion to investigate and combat anti-
Semitism has been announced. While
seemingly unconnected, the commis-
sion is one of Israel's responses to the
current Palestinian intifada (uprising).

New York/JTA — Cyrus Vance, who
helped negotiate the Camp David
Accords, died Saturday in New York at
84. Vance was President Carter's U.S.
secretary of state when Israel and
Egypt signed the historic accords,
which led to the 1979 peace treaty
between the two nations.

BEND THE ISSUE
Diplomatic efforts against Israel are being
vigorously pursued by the Palestinians
and their allies. These include the anti-
Israel attacks at the United Nation's
conference on racism in Durban,
South Africa, last August; continuin

of Israel rom U.N. and
ott?'';''' motional bodies; charges that
'IA the Sept. 11 attacks
)..ty and Washington,
Islamic clerics
1).C.; an'.,
d the Jewish faith
demons
in their sermons.
Professor Irwin Kotler, a noted
authority on anti Semitism from
McGill University in Montreal, has
described these efforts as based upon the
"Zionism Is Racism" canard, charging
not that Jews as individuals but Jews
read Israel --- are illegit-
as a nation
imate, evil and worthy of elimination.

-

—

-Allan Gale, Jewish Community
Council ofkfetrapolitan 'Detroit

1/18
2002

19

